Total War: Rome II Release Date Unleashed, New Trailer

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Total War: Rome II has a release date. Facts, straight at the front. That’s what I’m all about: business. Focused on the matter at hand, not allowing myself to wander off and start writing about bees or nostrils, like some airheaded buffoon. Too many gaming sites these days seem to think that they, the author – in my case John Walker, aged 35, living in Bath, son of Meg and Hugh, about 5’11”, blue/green eyes, first class degree in Youth & Community Work And Applied Theology, married, no children, one cat – are the more important aspect of the story rather than the news itself, the precious pieces of information for which the reader has come to the website, not wanting it to be obfuscated amongst trivial nonsense about the writer’s breakfast (I didn’t even have any breakfast today, so couldn’t tell you if I wanted to) or what colour socks they’re wearing. (Black.)

Oh shit, the date. It’s the 3rd September 2013. And that’s everywhere, all at once, digital and physical. No oceans, woo!

Obviously there are pre-orders, but as an RPS reader you know better than to pre-order anything, because that’s a stupid thing to do. And if anyone’s in the mood to get wound up about something, pre-orderers will get the first DLC on release day, the Greek States Culture Pack which includes three playable factions – Epirus, Athens and Sparta. Here’s a trailer to rub that in:

The real madness here is this digital download pre-order costs a whopping £45. It seems impossible to believe they’ll be charging that much on release? Surely not?

There’s also word that there’s to be a Collector’s Edition, but only 22,000 of them will be made.

It,

“comes in a debossed Steelbook™ case, laser-etched with your unique collector’s number in Roman numerals”

because if there’s anything we know about PC gaming, it’s that it’s the box that matters the most. You’ll also get a tabula board and pieces, some dice for that, a card game called Total War Cards: PUNIC WARS (I imagine you’re supposed to shout the latter half), a canvas map (and okay, here I stop feeling cynical and just applaud Sega), and a “fully functional Onager, or Roman siege catapult”. I swear, that’s what they say:

John are you going to ask them about the price? I don’t want Publishers thinking they can start to just bump the PC prices up because we are getting new consoles this Christmas and the games might see a rise.

I thought Shogun 2 was no fun at all. I loved combat in the total war games not for offering the large number of troops per se, but because the large numbers allow the player to come up with tactics which go beyond “move cavalry to archers, preferably from the higher ground.” It allows the player to come up with complicated manoeuvres to create local advantages and to break enemy formations. I’m not particularly interested in simply executing the obviously advantageous strategy, I much prefer the thinking about what would actually be a good strategy.

By introducing a much stronger rock-paper-scissors mechanic in Shogun 2, this became basically impossible since the rocks could not defeat the papers anymore even when outmanoeuvring them. The rock-paper-scissors was always the best strategy, so the player interaction came from executing rock-paper-scissors successfully, which I find rather dull.

Yeah, that’s accurate. It’s not quite as simple as having 3 different unit types, and there are some special units that cut across categories, but for the most part each unit has a clear counter. Swords counter spears, spears counter cavalry, cavalry counters swords, etc.

Rock, Paper, Scissors implies there are only 3 kinds of units and completely ignores formation, moral, hybrids, and flanking.

Calvary folds under both spears AND swords in a prolonged fight, but they can dismount and hold in a fight better. Bow Samurai can switch to an effective melee unit(won’t break like Yari Bows). Guns, bomb throwers, and cannons can break moral of any unit. Calvary come in multiple varieties which aren’t strictly used for charging bows. In other words, formation and tactics are paramount. If you play the game trying to “counter” the enemies army, you are going to have a bad time. A army will be well rounded and will rely on formations and tactics, not having X number of units that are designed to kill the other.

I think if your rocks come into contact with the enemies paper then you have not, in fact, actually outmaneuvered them. Outmaneuvering comes with getting your rocks past the paper to the scissors.

Regardless of whether a game uses a form of rock, paper, scissors or not there will always be an optimal strategy, even if it’s just use more men. Spotting that strategy is relatively easy. Being able to execute it while the enemy tries to stop you is where the depth comes in.

its why rome 1 was so good, unit variety, i used to MP battle a little and everyone would always pick Roman, id counter this with Egyptian,

So me vs Romans
I set up a 360 phalanx round my archers
Step 1 archer battle mine survive due to having best armor for an archer, but alas run out of ammo.
Step 2 Romans attack, my phalanx troop have weak attack but excellent defense and so hold out.
Step 3 he moves his cav preparing to break my formation.
Step4 I move my hidden cav to attack his, (they have axes and have huge bonus against other armoured cav)
Step 5 charge my cav into his rear, repeatedly until they rout.

go to custom battle, set funds to 800,
buy 1 general and 1 katana cav for you
buy 1 general and 1 yari spear for them
delete generals. set yourself as defender
load aki fields
ride to halfway up a hill.. gallop some to get there first. dismount, but stay near horses….
ACHIEVEMENT GET: (bonuses can be traded… speed+charge for terrain)
wait for the enemy.. if they charge, retreat further up the hill, if they walk.. charge down at them.
WIN!

I think your way of thinking might be wrong then, since every Total War has been more about the units than the unit types they belong to. Although I do have to say, this is more apparent in Shogun 2 and especially Fall of the Samurai.
But then again, it was also there in Empire.

Ya man, I think that Shogun has been the most disappointing Total War to date. I thought the combat was dull but more importantly I thought the world map was incredibly dull. You just advanced across the map. I loved the three theatres in Empire or the crusades in Medieval.

I’ve played every one of the Total War games bar the original Shogun and this is the only one I didn’t sink hundreds of hours into. I bought it when it was brand new and played it for maybe 15 hours desperately looking for something to find intriguing and coming away empty handed. Maybe it was just the setting didn’t appeal to me?

I’m looking forward to Rome though, lots of variety and a setting I love – I can’t wait.

I agree. I think it’s fine to preorder when a series has a good track record. Sure you’re taking a risk (you’d have thought the Sim City series would be a safe buy), but you’re not just blind buying.

Anyway, from the perspective of someone whose only motivation is to show enthusiasm and play a game they’re excited about as soon as possible, preordering isn’t that different from funding a game on Kickstarter.

I played Total War: Empire earlier this week, to remind myself exactly how much I enjoy TW games. Which was good, because it reminded me how atrocious the battle AI was and how enemy armies conveniently marched in single file to be mowed down by my riflemen like a period themed shooting gallery.

Has the AI improved any since Empire? I love everything else about the TW games but the AI just disillusions me after only a few battles.

Yes it has, it isn’t perfect, but compared to Empire it has become a genius. Both campaign and battle AI is now decent, it’s even possible to ally with your neighbors if you want. Also: the Fall of the Samurai expansion is basically “Empire how it should have been”, thanks to AI improvements.

I just started playing empire this week, having never played it before.

I’m playing Darthmod Empire 8.0 and I am finding it more enjoyable than my time in Shogun 2 thus far. I’m only 12 turns in but I find each turn I am making many key choices and decisions.

Battle AI seems fine in Darthmod (not sure about vanilla)… only issues I’ve run into is units getting stuck in urban areas – and sometimes getting completely stuck on the walls. This has only happened twice in my 10 hours so far

Empire was a stinker. Buggy as shit, unfriendly to modding, the normally bad AI was especially crap and had no idea how to use muskets, samey boring units with none of Shogun 2’s style to make up for it. If I were less of a TW fanboi it would’ve put me off the whole franchise.

Worth buying — after waiting. I got Shogun 2 about 18 months or so after release in a Steam sale. Got all the DLC as well. Plus good old CA had almost got the worst bugs out by then. Not quite all, but enough, and the most egregious – at least on my rig – was fixed in a patch barely a month or so later.

I remember the original Rome’s static attacker siege AI on release.And so, so, so many others.

Loads of retailers have it up for pre-order (including the DLC) at £25.98 – Zavvi, The Hut, Play etc. Everywhere else has it at £30 or £35. There’s pretty much only Steam and the SEGA store that are asking £45, and Steam has never been competitive on new game prices.

At the moment it’s just the Greek States that are separate – it is indeed a little annoying though. The funny thing is that if they were just included in the game I’d probably pre-order, but packing them in like this is so stupid!!

On the report of the Venerable Wiki, the eight factions in the main game are Rome (obvs), Carthage, Macedonia, Iceni, Averni, Suebi, Parthia and Egypt. I’m not a fan of Day 1 DLC either, but on the other hand, by the Roman period, the Greek city states have fallen pretty far from their earlier prominence, so not including them by default is probably not a great loss.

Base playable factions are Rome, Carthage, Egypt, Macedon, Parthia, and British, French, and German flavors of Barbarian. They will also release Pontus as a free Day 1 DLC. For the record, if you count the free DLC as base and ignore the fact that Rome is one faction instead of three, that’s the same number of playable factions as in the original Rome: Total War.

Leaving Sparta for DLC is a pretty obvious, if somewhat cynical, move.

It’s not ideal, but I seem to recall the Hattori faction in Shogun 2 being ‘special edition’ only and that’s the frickin’ ninja faction. They were subsequently sold post-release as dlc, along with things like the Ikko-Ikki and a bunch of unit packs – hell, even gore was dlc.

But honestly, there was enough content to keep you going for all of the hours, without the extra factions, they’re for completionists looking for a new way to play the game, rather than sort of core aspects, removed and hidden behind a paywall.

I guess if you disagree with the practice then vote with your wallets by not buying the extras and not pre-ordering.

They know that however much we complain, we will still buy. Voting with my wallet is difficult because… well, Rome 2! And the greeks were by far my favourite faction in Rome, which is why it hurts that they are DLC in this game.

Forget Athens and Sparta – they were pretty irrelevant by the 200s BC. And though Epirus wasn’t at the start of the era, they pretty much were after Pyrrhus died. If we’re throwing in single cities, though, why not Syracuse (minor power, but way more important at the time)? Pergamon (very important later)?

But no, the biggest fail is that there’s no Seleukids. Which is a pretty big fucking gap, no?

Surely the basis OUGHT to be historical importance, no? How else would one choose? There’s a difference between “making your own history from a reasonably accurate starting position” and “making your own history from a disjointed quasi-realistic fantasy”.

As to gaps geographical – Pontus and Parthia aren’t right there; there’s a whole heck of a lot of ground to cover between Amaseia and Zadrakata (and Egyptian Gaza in the other direction). The whole Eastern Mediterranean in the 3rd C BC was defined by the Syrian wars. Hell, Hannibal fought his last battles under the Seleukid standard. The in-game side effect of this is that, playing as one of those three factions (Pontus, Parthia, Egypt), you’ve got a giant rebel area to blitz as opposed to a more competent AI faction blocking your way. As to unit selection – to be REALLY pedantic, nobody used chariots at this point (well, the old-fashioned British Celts did, but…); plus, the Egyptians used African elephants while the Syrians had Indian elephants, their auxilia (to inappropriately use the Roman term) were totally different, and their methods of administration were totally different. TOTALLY different. And then – who needs Epirus, since Egypt already has pikes and elephants?

Plus the fact that they fell apart in our history means there’s plenty of cause to give them a uniquely difficult starting position – one where you’d be hard pressed to keep things together for the early game, let alone expand. There’s only so many different ways to expand out from one or two provinces! Holding something disparate and decentralized against powerful neighbours would be a genuinely different flavour of gameplay.

But I know most people don’t really care about that level of detail. Still, the existence of EB (or RTR, or RS, etc) means I’m not the only one, right?

EDIT: They [Seleukids], and some other ‘filling the gaps’ factions (Iberians and/or Celtiberians, Armenia, Skythians and/or Sarmatians, I could go on) and just going to be DLC later, or I’ll eat my hat. So fuck ’em for that, too.

“Surely the basis OUGHT to be historical importance, no? How else would one choose? ”

I’d choose based on unit selection and a strategically interesting starting position. And it’s not like the Seleucids won’t be in the game at all, they’re just not a playable faction. There haven’t actually been rebel factions for a few games in the series now. All provinces are controlled by a faction, playable or not. Often a minor faction will grow to be one of the dominant powers in the end-game.

While preventing a large empire from falling apart could make for an interesting game (Hello CK2), I don’t think it’s necessarily a good fit for this particular game. Almost all the systems in a Total War game are based around developing and growing empires, it’s just not really geared towards representing decline. I think there’s something to be said for focusing on the main thrust of the game and not getting too bogged down for the sake of historical accuracy. Ultimately it’s a game based on history but not a history simulator.

You’re certainly not alone in wishing for a game that is more strict with regards to historical accuracy but personally I’m glad that CA haven’t lost sight of the fact that they’re making a game first and are prepared to use a little dramatic license to make for a better one.

Edit: In response to your edit. Ok, when people say they want all the factions from history, to this level of detail, at release they just don’t have realistic expectations.

What other game or series even comes close to what CA are doing here? Starcraft has three unique factions. Games like CK2 allow you to play as anyone but make all factions pretty much identical.

You can pour hundreds of hours into a Total War game and still have more to do for the same price as an FPS you could finish in a weekend.

Yeah, yeah. It’s how I’d choose (there’s good reasons why I’m not in charge). I grant that with a limit on the number of factions, you’re going to have to make calls as to what rosters and parts of the map you’re choosing to start with. (But c’mon – Athens and Sparta? Both poor, depopulated, and long past relevence?)

I know, but non-playable factions will always be ‘rebels’ in my mind. Splitting ’em up was a good move (and sure helped the AI). Edit for clarity – in my experience playable AI factions almost always handle themselves better than non-playable AI factions. This is probably just my imagination.

It’s not unrealistic to expect a bit more than they’ve announced – we know very little about the development process (including how long it’s been so far). For that matter, it was always (barring SEGA going the way of THQ) essentially a given that this game would eventually happen. We have no idea how long they’ve been working at it. We have no idea how much time it takes to implement any given feature set.

Starcraft has three factions with no overlap at all, which are entirely made up; it’s not that comparable (not to the vastly smaller difference between Antigonid phalanx and Ptolemaic phalanx, certainly!). Though, the question as to whether it’s harder to invent something that’ll hang together, versus some rigour in historical research, I dunno.

I’d have more respect if there was more openness about their plans for expansions (well, ahem, DLC, insert-old-man-grumble). What’s in the pipeline, what’s definitely out, that sort of thing. But that’s not how any video game marketing has ever worked. And that’s not the devs’ fault, so, uh, oh well, I guess.

Shogun, Medieval, Rome, Medieval 2, Shogun 2 — all great. Napoleon was okay, I guess, but I just couldn’t come to grips with the largest possible engagements being of a regimental scale, at most (somehow, I found this easier to tolerate with swords and bows than muskets). Looked at Empire– I got it in a bundle sale– and was so put-off by some set-piece mission and the hideously stretched-out campaign map that I just gave up on it.

Not going to preorder this, though. Selling “DLC” like that is just tacky.

Battle’s aside, I’d say Crusader Kings II does a far better (and more realistic) job of the strategy side of things for the Medieval Era.

I enjoyed Shogun II, but the strategy map AI was incredibly predictable, and the same old issues were in it that haunted all the TW series. On normal AI mode, its far too easy, whilst on hard difficulty, it was completely unrealistic (Allies don’t keep their word etc).

I’ve not seen if stuff like baggage trains and food supply are implemented – one of the most fundamental issues facing any army was supplies – and many Roman Consul was beaten after losing theirs. So for me, as good as these series are, they still feel pretty arcade like.

Hopefully the Rome series from Paradox will be next on the cards after Europa Universalis

For example, in the multiplayer, many battles turned out to be just your army, and opposing you would be some dude with his general and horses, and they’d just tire you troops to death. I pretty much gave up the multiplayer after coming across that twice, although I beat the second guy by hiding troops and eventually chasing him around the map like some sort of Samurai Benny Hill tribute.

that sounds like an issue of rank that the other guy could not of avoided.

Higher ranked players generals cost more money to field… when they get pitted against a new player and the game mode is set to “small armies” – as it is locked to that with new players… the vet player can literally not afford to field anything but his general.

Pretty big design flaw from a matchmaking perspective, too bad that is all you got to experience.

Surely with a “first class degree in … Applied Theology” you’d be an excellent healer though John? If D&D has taught be nothing else it’s the three applications of theology are healing, buffs and making the undead unhappy.

I’m increasingly finding my reaction to this type day-one “DLC” for what is obviously finished and core material is to wait for the entire thing to go on sale.

Metro Last Light’s “Ranger Mode” (the hardest difficulty setting) is another that leaves me cold for a game I was hot for.

I’d like to have this game at release, but having to pre-order or pay extra for core factions like the Greek states is a shameless manipulation on their part that I’m increasingly reluctant to partake in. It’s no mistake that the popular Spartans are a faction they are using as a carrot/stick.

In the UK at least you can get the vast majority of new releases for under £30, sometimes under £25. In fact I can think of quite a few AAA games I got for £20 on release day including Borderlands, Dark Souls and Bulletstorm.

Funnily enough I’m half way through my first Shogun 2 campaign right now. Loving it, but I prefer the Roman setting, so it’s a no brainer to pick up Rome 2.

At £26 I think the pre-order is probably worth it in this case. You can weigh the risk against the relatively bug free state of Shogun 2 at release and the fact that even the buggy TW games do get fixed eventually.

One date for everyone? Now, I can easily find you several dev/publishers who will explain that this is, indeed, a madness!
These guys must have a time machine. That’s why they’re so good at making historical games, they’re just going back to observe the real deal…

Shogun 2 was great until you had to buy DLC to keep up with your builds in MP. At least I waited until the DLC packs were on sale for under $1 each ;) I still dislike having to buy little unit packs, but MP is in Shogun 2 very exciting and fun with friends you meet online.

The DLC sucks, and it sucks they’re planning to release faction piecemeal (good old days of shifting names in an ini) but damn, canvas man, little oranger to go with my mini trebuchet (and the big trebuchet I built :D, and hopefully big ballista by time of release)… that’s good s***!

Now, I just have to hope it actually arrives – some of these posties are clued up on release dates – my shiney metal CoD 4 never arrived :(

I doubt anybody will actually have to pay that much, but I don’t feel like £45 would be an unreasonable price for a game like Rome 2 (assuming it’s good of course).

I could stand to pay a little more for big budget PC exclusives if it meant more of them being made again. It’s not like game prices keep going up and up – in real terms they must be way lower than they were ~15 years ago. The game being chopped up into DLC turns me off more than prices going up a bit would.

If piracy weren’t such an easy alternative, I think they could easily command £45 for Rome 2 and people would pay it. Hard to charge a fair price when you always have to compete with ‘Free’ though.

Well it’s about $230 (£124.99) here in New Zealand. I don’t have the disposable income I used to, but Total War has been good to me over the years, each one resulting in 80-200 hours. Pre-ordering doesn’t seem so silly when I know the game is going to keep me entertained for so long. And I’ve always been hooked on the idea of collectors editions if the game is valuable to me (Witcher, Starcraft, Total War, etc). I like the art, I like the little extra things they include. And sitting and waiting means that a) I miss out b) the price goes up for several months – a year before coming back down.

Furthermore, I have until the release date to change my mind. It’s not like they charge my credit card before the game is shipped. Paying BEFORE the game is released? Madness.

For everyone calling CA evil because of the day one DLC, they actually have a pretty good excuse for it. They had a deadline where they had to finish all content that was going to be in the base game. Once that deadline passed, they had to start the long process of optimizing the game and finding bugs. Basically, they didn’t have as much time as they needed to make all the factions they wanted. BUT, because of steam’s DLC system, they can keep working on content despite the fact that the game is supposed to be content complete, hence the free day one DLC (btw they said that all faction DLC is gonna be free). Hope this clears it up for some of you. Go to the totalwar forums (link to totalwar.com) if you don’t believe me, they can probably explain it better then I can anyway

Dear fellow RPS RTW fans… A preorder on September 2 is still a preorder.

We’ve seen this so many times, in the month leading up to a big release like this one you will have a MUCH clearer picture about what the final game will be, due to an almost overwhelming number of previews, interviews, and actual in-game footage. Granted, this can’t replace a proper review or WIT, but you have literally nothing to gain by ordering the game this far in advance. Why not take advantage of all that inevitable pre-release information to make your decision? On September 2, weigh everything you know about the game and decide whether the preorder is worth it to you. You lose nothing, but you stand a chance to avoid making a regrettable decision.

But this is Total War, what could go wrong? Well, plenty. With any new iteration of a well-loved series, there is a risk of YOUR PERSONAL favorite feature of said series being discarded. Total War games have tons of working parts, and what you deem absolutely essential to YOUR enjoyment of the game might be viewed as a vestigial remnant of a by-gone era. So yes, while I agree that Total War has more or less remained Total War throughout, there is a tiny fraction of a chance that this will be a bold new attempt at “streamlining” the game in order to appeal to a wider audience. If anything, the offer of preorders this far out should trip warning sensors in your brain, since we know very little at this point.

There’s also a nominal economic reason to always pay for something as close as possible to the time you will receive it, ESPECIALLY if paying sooner will not change the time you receive the product. During inflationary times, and dealing with an item at a fixed cost, it’s better to keep the money in your bank for a few months instead of the other guy’s bank. Money is also worth ever-so-slightly more now than it will be in the near future. This one is just a small side-benefit however, so I’ll not belabor it.

The best way to mend an utterly incompetent campaign AI is to give it even more features and freedom to be incompetent at while pasting it in yet another coat of shiny graphics.

Medieval TW 1 was the high point. Since then CA seems to have developed a very low opinion of the attention spans and tolerance levels of their fans. I suppose it makes sound business sense in catching the eye of the wider casual market but still it saddens me.

I sometimes wonder what would happen in the industry if the graphics ‘arms race’ somehow ended and AAA games were relatively easy to produce. A man can dream, I guess.